Cuts & Kisses
by Otogakure Tsunade
Summary: Tsunade decides to visit a locked memory above the Village of Konohagakure. Reminding herself of the past, a major part comes from the shadows and offers Tsunade a place beside his side. To escape her torment, will Tsunade accept?


A TsunadeXOrochimaru as requested by Ada.

Silence, the perfect thing to use if you want to just escape the warped world around you. Or if you're trying to reflect on your darkest secrets. Everyone has them, even the most powerful person in your town or village. Tsunade has one. Usually most secrets are reasonable but...is falling for the enemy really reasonable. Pondering on her thoughts, Tsunade goes to the cabin that has not been touched since Team Sarutobi became Chuunin. Located high up on a hill outside Konoha, just behind the bushes. Yet it seems her darkest secret will come out of the shadows soon enough...

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Standing still in the middle of the one floor oak cabin, the Fifth Hokage sighed slightly as she lit the two oil flames. It wasn't a well decorated cabin, nothing fancy. It was a place where Team Sarutobi would go as children, when they were still all on the right side of the tracks. There were three beds each with their own desks at the foot of them, covered in dust that flew across the room when opened.

"So this is where I used to come...Back when he was still with me." Listening to the incoming storm howl outside, Tsunade knew she would have to spend the night in her Nostalgic childhood shed -Which didn't frighten her at all, despite her hating having to spend the night in random locations of Konohagakure.- Wearing a white kimono with a black sash to hide herself as she exited Konoha for the night, the Fifth Hokage removed her rice hat and placed it on her own bed which she never actually spent the night in as a child, this would be her first...shame it was alone.

"Ahahaha, I wonder what Jiraiya kept in his desk..." She thought out loud wandering over to Jiraiya's old oak desk. Tugging at the old chain that kept it closed, a mushroom cloud of dust exploded in her face making her gag for a minute. Nobody had never been in there apart from him, that was for sure. Oddly enough there were only three items in there. A broken kunai, a photo of the first day with Team Sarutobi which almost made Tsunade laugh.

"Dear god, Make Out Paradise love chronicles? He had the idea for that stuff in his head as a kid? I guess that was his dream, the only one he'd ever want to achieve anyway." Tsunade smiled to herself, a collector of Jiraiya's book series would pay more for the rough copies than Tsunade's necklace. That's how big a series it was.

Jiraiya was always travelling though, he'd probabally forgotten about this place. Tsunade bet -despite that never being her best choice...- that he had seen more exotic and secretive places than a cabin he helped build over forty years ago. She also pondered on the thought did Orochimaru remember it?

"God, was I really that clumsy and spiteful when I was little!" Sitting on her bed beside the light brown rice hat, Tsunade laughed at her diary where she wrote about how Sarutobi-sensei was a nasty old goat at times and how Jiraiya's wart resembled "Grandad's big mountains". Though when Tsunade-Hime went to turn the page, she noticed a few were missing.

"I could have sworn I never removed anything from my diary...but that was forty years ago, and I was clumsy and arrogant as a child." Thinking to herself, Tsunade placed her diary back in the drawer and closing it shut, loosening her snow white kimono before she would go to bed and ponder on her thoughts and actions to come...yet something was missing, him.

"Forgive me, I'm a fool to be doing this..." The Fifth scowled apologizing herself. Standing up straight, Tsunade-Hime stared at Orochimaru's desk and bed, out of reach, away tucked in the corner just like his personality. It often nibbled on Tsunade's mind if she actually reached into him and touched him, would he have went down the path we did? Was it Tsunade neglecting her childhood love that drove him to isolation?

Though the Hokage thought she was taking her time, the flames danced wildly in the lanterns as Tsunade quickly rushed across the room and opened Orochimaru's drawer to see if he did really keep something to remind him of Tsunade. There was no lock though, and no dust. Mind you, Orochimaru was a very careful and organized shinobi and still is...

Upon rummaging through his drawer and looking at the early photographs of Team Sarutobi, her heart melted. At least he still cared for her back then.

"He...Had a diary?" Tsunade blurted aloud. Opening the dark yellow leather diary, the Fifth Hokage became absorbed in his entries about how each day challenged him and that his feelings for Tsunade were stronger as each day passed. Then something really stood out.

"These...are my diary pages, about how I felt for him. How?..." Still puzzled, Tsunade read on. There was an entry last week, a week just after their battle where Kabuto nearly killed her.

"I regret to say that emotions have gotten the better of me once more, I could not kill Tsunade. I can tell we both have feelings for each other. I pray that we won't be doing this for the rest of our days. Trapped in the grapple hold of two nations. That's why I wanted her to heal my arms and come away with me...If only Isolation did not consume me when I left for my own deeds."

Dropping the diary and staggering backwards, Tsunade felt two ice cold arms wrap around her neck. Had enemy shinobi really followed her?

"Tsunade..."

"...Oro...Orochimaru?" Feeling his cold fingers run across her face, Tsunade turned around in awe to see the man who she wished came to visit this very night stand in front of her.

"My mouth wanted to fill with blood for trying to speak to you on the battlefield. I couldn't. I didn't want to burn down that beautiful thing we had, Tsunade." Still his usual self, Orochimaru's features hadn't changed. His arms were slightly healed however, allowing mobility. Maybe not strength. He was also wearing a Kimono, a deep purple type colourwith a black outline.

"I understand, you were alone...I'm just...I don't know what to do Orochimaru. We stand on different sides of the line. You fight for your cause and I fight for a completely separate one..." With tears swelling up in her eyes, she wrapped her arms around the Snake Sannin and sobbed.

"Don't. I followed you here, nobody else did. Until...until something can be sorted out between us, until there is only one narrow way for both of us to live together. Then we can meet here. I brought us a gift also." Attempting to brighten the mood, Orochimaru withdrew a bottle of sake from under his kimono and escorted Tsunade to his bed where they sat cross legged staring at each other, taking swigs from the bottle. Holding hands, locking eyes...

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"One more just to...to take off the edge Tsunade." Orochimaru smiled, both were rather intoxicated now. Handing the last remainder of the bottle to Tsunade who was staring at Orochimaru sweetly. Perhaps there was a way this could work out.

"A little more Orochimaru, and I'd fall of this planet entirely..." Tsunade laughed taking the last gulp of sake before placing it on the floor. There was a still moment of silence between the Missing-Nin and Hokage, who would have ever thought those two ranks would make a couple.

"Then, I can save you by grabbing you." Extending his arms out, Orochimaru gently pulled Tsunade's face towards her own before they engaged in kissing once more. Nothing could stop them from loving each other, not the wild storm battering on the cabin door. Not Kabuto, Orochimaru's short sighted apprentice and not Konohagakure. It wasn't the sake talking, they truly had feelings for each other.

Slowly, Kissing moved to hugging, hugging to untying the Kimono's of each other and then the rest was just a pleasureable night for both of the Sannin to enjoy until the storm settled....

---

"Or...Orochimaru?" Waking up with a bit of a hangover and nearly bare naked except from her Kimono over her chest and her rice hat down on the lower region, Tsunade slowly rose to her feet and looked around. Was it a dream? Did she really just get drunk by herself.

Then she saw it, the diary was placed neatly on the table, folded open at the most recent date. Early this morning.

"Dear Tsunade...I am sorry I could not waken you, if I did I would fear that you would try to stop me from leaving and I could not have that. We will meet again every month on the second Sunday if you wish. Though...I left a gift for you in your drawer, it is only an option. Not a choice. I've came to respect you as a friend, as my lover. I also hope you make the decision for yourself and not just to see me. I chose the wrong path, make sure you follow your own dreams and emotions."

Tying her kimono, Tsunade walked towards the drawer and tugged it open, enduring the loud creak. She must have been out cold not to hear it. Inside was a set of Orochimaru's apprentice robes, similar to which he described Sasuke Uchiha would be wearing, with a small note.

"If you decide to follow me, then it is best to wear these before you come near Otogakure. I do not want you harmed by any of the creations. The creations, the ones who had lives before I got them."

Now Tsunade had to follow her heart. If she truly loved him, she wouldn't wait every month. She had to go to Orochimaru, he was actually not a cold person anymore, he cared for Tsunade better than Dan did.

"I guess this is the narrow path Orochimaru mentioned...And I follow it, I am sorry Konohagakure, Naruto, Jiraiya...Shizune." Removing her Kimono and putting on the Sound Shinobi garments, Tsunade left the cabin, locked the door and walked through the bush to the tip of the hill, taking one final glance at Konoha.

Would she grow to hate it? The land in which she and her lover first met?


End file.
